Sunday marked a decade since Obama was elected President of the United States, and we, the people, are nostalgic.

The former president commemorated the occasion on his Instagram page. He brought up old memories and used the anniversary to encourage his followers to vote.

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As I reflect on election night ten years ago today, I can’t help but think about where my political career started. I wasn’t running for office. I was running a voter-registration drive in Chicago. What I learned then — and what would become the premise of my 2008 campaign — was that you couldn't just fight for existing votes. You had to reach out to all of these people who had lost faith and lost trust, and get them off the sidelines. So during our first campaign, when I started seeing all these stories about record turnout in communities all over the country — from young people in line for hours in Iowa to elderly folks in lawn chairs down in Florida — I knew that we had shown what is possible when everybody decides to participate. And that, in and of itself, gave people a sense of their own power — their own agency in the kind of country we want to leave for our kids. When more people get off the sidelines and decide to participate, our country becomes a little more representative of its people — of everyone's collective decision. And American politics can change as a result. So on Election Day this Tuesday, I’m not just asking you to vote. I'm asking you to really show up once again. Talk with your friends, convince some new voters, and get them out to vote because then something powerful happens. Change happens. Hope happens. And with each new step we take in the direction of fairness, and justice, and equality, and opportunity, hope spreads.

A post shared by Barack Obama (@barackobama) on

Former Vice President Joe Biden tweeted his thoughts about the milestone: 

Former White House photographer and shade king extraordinaire Pete Souza posted a previously unpublished photo of Obama embracing his daughter Malia on election night:

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An unpublished photograph from ten years ago tonight: President-elect Barack Obama with daughter Malia on election night in Chicago. I had spent a couple of years documenting his first two years (2005-2006) in the Senate and the first few months of his Presidential campaign in 2007 for the Chicago Tribune. But then I quit the Tribune to teach photojournalism at Ohio University and only covered a few campaign events in 2008. On November 4, 2008, I flew up to Chicago, and through tears, photographed the celebration. I remember a photographer-friend said to me that night, “I’m so glad I am alive to see this happen.” He, too, had tears in his eyes. And little did I know that just a couple of months later I would receive a phone call that would change my life.

A post shared by Pete Souza (@petesouza) on

Others across the country also reflected on the meaning of Obama’s election.

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